Marvel's new Spider-Man animated series

[Unspeakable Evil]

Anya just generally isn't like her comic book counterpart, period.

To be fair neither are Miles or Gwen.

[Frontier]

To be fair neither are Miles or Gwen.

Well, Gwen at least has the excuse of hardly ever being consistent characterization-wise .

Always felt like the show was going for a weird 616/Spectacular/Spider-Gwen hybrid.

[PCN24454]

Well, Gwen at least has the excuse of hardly ever being consistent characterization-wise .

Always felt like the show was going for a weird 616/Spectacular/Spider-Gwen hybrid.

Unfortunately, she doesn't have that excuse since it was the writer's job to give her a consistent character anyways.

[TheCape]

Well, Gwen at least has the excuse of hardly ever being consistent characterization-wise .

Always felt like the show was going for a weird 616/Spectacular/Spider-Gwen hybrid.

Honestly the idea of Miles and Peter being essentially peers in school and having powers around the same time just sound bizarre.

[Darthfury78]

There has been talks recently to bring back the 1990's FOX Kids X-Men: The Animated series with the same creative team:

https://www.cbr.com/x-men-the-animat...evival-disney/

I wonder if we might see a similar treatment with FOX Kids 1990's Spider-Man: The Animated series with a 6th season from where it left off to find Mary Jane?

[Spidey_62]

There has been talks recently to bring back the 1990's FOX Kids X-Men: The Animated series with the same creative team:

https://www.cbr.com/x-men-the-animat...evival-disney/

I wonder if we might see a similar treatment with FOX Kids 1990's Spider-Man: The Animated series with a 6th season from where it left off to find Mary Jane?

Unlike a lot of other folks who say 90s Spidey didn't get a proper ending I think the finale was still pretty satisfying in the regard that the main character completed their arc. So in those terms I don't think it's a Spider-Man show that is aching for a revival like say Spectacular (one day if all the stars align...it'd be nice). Unlimited just had 10 more episodes left to tell with 5 already written and that ended on the biggest cliffhanger of any of these, but I don't ever see them doing a TV show revival of that one unfortunately. The MTV Spidey show also had a pretty big cliffhanger with him just giving up, I think ultimately it resolved a lot of threads and brought it to a strong closing point but obviously you can imagine and speculate "How is he gonna put on the costume again after that? His return is gonna be epic!"- I know I did forever haha.

However! All that aside, I would welcome a revival of the 90s show. Anything please, anything more interesting, well-produced, and with wider appeal than the current crop of Spidey shows. It wouldn't be bad returning to that world because it's a pretty faithful representation of the character and his world that doesn't take too many liberties (I mean it does with things like MJ falling through portals, but what I mean is the major beats of Spidey history are there thematically... lost love one, returns as a clone, etc.). I don't think the 90s show has aged totally well but it's still enjoyable, I'm grateful it was one of my earliest exposures to the character because I feel it set me up to "get" what the character was about and got me into the comics and I felt that same spirit in the comics with the way the character acted, the relationship drama, and the ongoing plot threads.

I mean the current shows are doing their job if kids are watching them and wanting to get into reading the comics (well, I guess the big goal nowadays is being hooked on the whole multimedia experience and going watch the movies instead). But I don't think they really are because in the case of Ultimate it often just feels like an advertisement for stuff everybody likes seeing in the MCU (Coulson, Nick Fury, SHIELD, Iron Man adoration, other Agents of SHIELD cast members, Hydra overload, lots of Loki) but sometimes they want to do Spider-Man stuff and fit in Ultimate comics stuff on the side. Plus tonally, a lot of early USM episodes don't really balance the humor and drama well that Spider-Man is known for- instead relying heavily on humor. That's fine for a kids cartoon but is it really doing the best job at representing the character and introducing him to kids? I think it's dumbing it down for kids instead of respecting them. With the current show, I don't know.

It's great if people enjoy the stuff but I think audiences deserve better and so do the characters. We've seen it done better!

[Frontier]

Unlike a lot of other folks who say 90s Spidey didn't get a proper ending I think the finale was still pretty satisfying in the regard that the main character completed their arc. So in those terms I don't think it's a Spider-Man show that is aching for a revival like say Spectacular (one day if all the stars align...it'd be nice). Unlimited just had 10 more episodes left to tell with 5 already written and that ended on the biggest cliffhanger of any of these, but I don't ever see them doing a TV show revival of that one unfortunately. The MTV Spidey show also had a pretty big cliffhanger with him just giving up, I think ultimately it resolved a lot of threads and brought it to a strong closing point but obviously you can imagine and speculate "How is he gonna put on the costume again after that? His return is gonna be epic!"- I know I did forever haha.

However! All that aside, I would welcome a revival of the 90s show. Anything please, anything more interesting, well-produced, and with wider appeal than the current crop of Spidey shows. It wouldn't be bad returning to that world because it's a pretty faithful representation of the character and his world that doesn't take too many liberties (I mean it does with things like MJ falling through portals, but what I mean is the major beats of Spidey history are there thematically... lost love one, returns as a clone, etc.). I don't think the 90s show has aged totally well but it's still enjoyable, I'm grateful it was one of my earliest exposures to the character because I feel it set me up to "get" what the character was about and got me into the comics and I felt that same spirit in the comics with the way the character acted, the relationship drama, and the ongoing plot threads.

I mean the current shows are doing their job if kids are watching them and wanting to get into reading the comics (well, I guess the big goal nowadays is being hooked on the whole multimedia experience and going watch the movies instead). But I don't think they really are because in the case of Ultimate it often just feels like an advertisement for stuff everybody likes seeing in the MCU (Coulson, Nick Fury, SHIELD, Iron Man adoration, other Agents of SHIELD cast members, Hydra overload, lots of Loki) but sometimes they want to do Spider-Man stuff and fit in Ultimate comics stuff on the side. Plus tonally, a lot of early USM episodes don't really balance the humor and drama well that Spider-Man is known for- instead relying heavily on humor. That's fine for a kids cartoon but is it really doing the best job at representing the character and introducing him to kids? I think it's dumbing it down for kids instead of respecting them. With the current show, I don't know.

It's great if people enjoy the stuff but I think audiences deserve better and so do the characters. We've seen it done better!

I've always thought it was ironic that the Disney buyout led to longer runs of cartoons but less actual quality to them compared to their predecessors.

Like Spec only got 26 episode while USM got to reach 100 and this show will end up with roundabout 64 episodes.

I mean, I've enjoyed these shows to some degree myself but I won't deny I would have loved to have had 100+ episodes of Spec, WaTXM, or EMH.

[Pattern_Maker]

With the 90s show a lot of fans want to see Peter and Mary Jane have their happy ending. Sure, Peter's character concluded, but a lot of people want to see the him and MJ getting their happy ever after (or as close to it as Peter Parker can achieve).

Reruns of the 90s show and Unlimited on Toon Disney, and Amazing Friends on ABC Family were my first exposures to Spider-Man. Going by when I was born I should have grown up with the MTV animated series, but I had no clue MTV aired any cartoons during the channels history until high school. Spectacular, I saw the trailer that was in the cutscene gallery for Spider-Man: Friend or Foe and, belive that I played the game to remind myself of that show coming onto KidsWB.

I believe the main point of all the shows, not just the current Spider-Man and Marvel shows, all of them, are to get the viewers into reading the comic books and more importantly introducing them to the characters. Regardless of the writing Peter has been represented the same across each show with his themes being the same. You can say the same for Batman. The DCAU Batman, The Batman (2005-2007), the DCAMU, and Justice League Action each have different tones, but Batman is still Batman despite the different situations. Heck, The Batman was criticized for similar reasons to Marvel's Spider-Man, especially with the drastic character designs and a younger Bruce Wayne, and years after it ended its garnered a fanbase for the series.

The dumbing down I agree with, but I probably have a different look on what's considered dumbed down. But the humor/serious balance in the first two seasons of Ultimate Spider-Man was definitely handled poorly.

[Darthfury78]

What I want to see for the next Spider-Man animated series is to see the creative team follow the example of the comic book series, from start to finish. For example, could you imagine if the next Spider-Man cartoon follow the stories of Amazing Spider-Man from issue #1 through Issue #850? Most of the longest series like Dragonball, One Piece, and Bleach follow the comic book series canon. Imagine if the Spider-Man cartoon can directly follow the Amazing Spider-Man, excluding the satellite series?

[Spidey_62]

I've always thought it was ironic that the Disney buyout led to longer runs of cartoons but less actual quality to them compared to their predecessors.

Like Spec only got 26 episode while USM got to reach 100 and this show will end up with roundabout 64 episodes.

I mean, I've enjoyed these shows to some degree myself but I won't deny I would have loved to have had 100+ episodes of Spec, WaTXM, or EMH.

Definitely a bit of a quantity over quality situation. I remember a quote from Tom Brevroort saying something like there has to be a new Spidey cartoon on pretty much always cause every kid should have a Spidey show, I love Spidey so I can't disagree there lol, but with Ultimate and the current show there's so many episodes but only handfuls of which I can point to with each as being really good. Whereas with shows like Spectacular, WaTXM, EMH, those were creatively on fire with pretty much every episode at their height- using every bit of that real-estate totally effectively. The current show is better at using the real-estate than Ultimate with more serialization.

With the 90s show a lot of fans want to see Peter and Mary Jane have their happy ending. Sure, Peter's character concluded, but a lot of people want to see the him and MJ getting their happy ever after (or as close to it as Peter Parker can achieve).

Reruns of the 90s show and Unlimited on Toon Disney, and Amazing Friends on ABC Family were my first exposures to Spider-Man. Going by when I was born I should have grown up with the MTV animated series, but I had no clue MTV aired any cartoons during the channels history until high school. Spectacular, I saw the trailer that was in the cutscene gallery for Spider-Man: Friend or Foe and, belive that I played the game to remind myself of that show coming onto KidsWB.

I believe the main point of all the shows, not just the current Spider-Man and Marvel shows, all of them, are to get the viewers into reading the comic books and more importantly introducing them to the characters. Regardless of the writing Peter has been represented the same across each show with his themes being the same. You can say the same for Batman. The DCAU Batman, The Batman (2005-2007), the DCAMU, and Justice League Action each have different tones, but Batman is still Batman despite the different situations. Heck, The Batman was criticized for similar reasons to Marvel's Spider-Man, especially with the drastic character designs and a younger Bruce Wayne, and years after it ended its garnered a fanbase for the series.

The dumbing down I agree with, but I probably have a different look on what's considered dumbed down. But the humor/serious balance in the first two seasons of Ultimate Spider-Man was definitely handled poorly.

Right, I can understand that. I always thought the bonkers idea of going to Victorian England with Carnage as Jack The Ripper would have been a fun concept. I think the finale we got with him saving all of reality, overcoming his dark mirror image, and meeting Stan was about as big as it gets (these days we're so used to seeing Spidey traveling to other dimensions and Stan showing up it's less of a big deal probably). Everybody woulda liked more episodes naturally but I'm personally fine with the finale being what it was. I really wonder what the X-Men TAS revival would look like if it gets the green light, cause animation's changed so much since then. Spidey TAS was one of the early adopters of digital paints and it had the CGI buildings. I think I got scarred after the Unlimited ending, the MTV ending with him quitting permanently as it stands, and the sour ending of Spectacular at its height that I'm happy SMTAS at least alludes to some happiness in the end.

It's all a good point, I know I'm not in the target demographic for these shows and it's not specifically aimed at trying to impress me and it's all totally fine. I honestly feel like I was spoiled by the high standards of Spectacular's airtight approach to juggling a million plot threads with precision it'd be inevitable none of the other stuff that follows measures up. I accepted Ultimate and the 2017 show just aren't at that level so I've been able to enjoy some of both. I think the last season of Ultimate is actually pretty fun... kinda like GI-Joe vs. Cobra but Spider-Team vs. Doc Ock/Hydra for 26 episodes, and there's some good character bits in there with some drama so at least it was something. The 2017 show it feels like it could be great and I wanna like it but so many things just bring it down for me, the Superior arc was the best stuff (maybe cause Peter was mostly absent haha).

There were the comments Loeb made about Marvel animation's goals 2012 onward where he made it clear they didn't want serialized stories because he said kids didn't want to/or couldn't follow stories that extend past an episode. That to me is dumbing it down, because kids don't have to be treated like that. Goes to show how silly that line of thinking is that they pretty quickly started to shift from it as soon as Wacker stepped in. Batman TAS was mostly contained single episode stories but Batman TAS Ultimate ain't, even with Paul Dini!

I think the best example of a Spidey show being able to be for kids and still appeal to older viewers (fans like me) is Spectacular because there's a lot of meat and potatoes to it beyond just seeing our favorite characters doing cool stuff and throwing a growth lesson in at the end. I'm not as big of a Batman fan so I'm less critical on media interpretations of him, I've pretty much enjoyed every animated incarnation there's been of him on TV. I remember getting pretty annoyed with Peter's characterization in early Ultimate episodes as he seemed to act pretty irresponsible and dumb to get moral lessons in there but also he's his usual smart self so it just doesn't gel when that one side was given the emphasis a lot of the time. He got better as the show went on but that always felt pretty at odds to me. It's like in Spectacular, he acts pretty dumb sometimes but it's out of hormones goofing up his judgement or his secret identity stuff goofing him up so it's easier for me to understand, rather than Peter unleashing the awesome android on a rampage or invading Latveria with a couple other kids.

What I want to see for the next Spider-Man animated series is to see the creative team follow the example of the comic book series, from start to finish. For example, could you imagine if the next Spider-Man cartoon follow the stories of Amazing Spider-Man from issue #1 through Issue #850? Most of the longest series like Dragonball, One Piece, and Bleach follow the comic book series canon. Imagine if the Spider-Man cartoon can directly follow the Amazing Spider-Man, excluding the satellite series?

Unlimited was originally pitched essentially as such! Well, a lower budget adaptation of the Lee/Ditko comics. I saw an early sketch from the producer's Facebook and I imagine it would have pretty much just been the way Unlimited ended up looking but with different content. I also saw some Paul Smith "Spidey TV art" online before with Ditko-esque Spidey sketches and villains like the Big-Man and Crime Master. Woulda been cool! Why can't we get a show steeped in aesthetics like that?

That is a really interesting thing to think about, though. Imagining a cartoon with a big superhero on an anime-type production line that literally just does what you say... AMAZING SPIDER-MAN EPISODE 382 MAXIMUM CARNAGE SAGA CHAPTER 12!! That'd be pretty wild.

[Digifiend]

Well, Gwen at least has the excuse of hardly ever being consistent characterization-wise .

Always felt like the show was going for a weird 616/Spectacular/Spider-Gwen hybrid.

Spec or the ASM movies, yeah. Honestly, all she takes from Gwen-65 is the fact she's a superhero. But she is certainly faithful to other past portrayals of Gwen, unlike Anya, who is a more mystical type in the comics rather than a science hero.

Rising Gwen was much more accurate to Earth-65 Gwen, that version has the band, the origin - there's even nothing to say that Miles or Peter exist in that continuity, meaning that Ghost-Spider is the main spider hero of that world.

[Frontier]

Rising Gwen was much more accurate to Earth-65 Gwen, that version has the band, the origin - there's even nothing to say that Miles or Peter exist in that continuity, meaning that Ghost-Spider is the main spider hero of that world.

Ghost Spider's whole deal on that show wouldn't really make sense with an established Spider-Man existing.

[Darthfury78]

Ghost Spider's whole deal on that show wouldn't really make sense with an established Spider-Man existing.

Spider-Gwen and Miles Morales should be in their own respective universe...

[Ursalink]

Spider-Gwen and Miles Morales should be in their own respective universe...

This series' versions are adaptations to the same universe than Peter Parker. It's kinda great, actually. I mean, I prefer Gwen Stacy becoming Spider-gwen over the old traumatic "Death of Gwen Stacy" thing. I know it's an important part of Spider-Man's history, but still, it's kinda "outdated" for these days.

[PCN24454]

This series' versions are adaptations to the same universe than Peter Parker. It's kinda great, actually. I mean, I prefer Gwen Stacy becoming Spider-gwen over the old traumatic "Death of Gwen Stacy" thing. I know it's an important part of Spider-Man's history, but still, it's kinda "outdated" for these days.

Well, few works actually adapt it outright, so you could honestly say that it's superfluous.